The Riddle of the Lost Lover

by Patricia Veryan

  * * *

  The office at the Horse Guards was not large and in the subdued light of this cold winter morning the presence of five gentlemen caused it to appear crowded. Although nobody spoke there was a distinct air of tension in the room. The youthful major seated at the desk appeared to be fascinated by the quill pen he turned in restless fingers; the rosy-cheeked and robust captain who stood leaning back against the front of the desk folded his arms and stared wistfully at a coat he coveted shamelessly; and the three young men who sat facing the desk exchanged incredulous glances. For several seconds the silence was broken only by the pattering of raindrops against the window.

  Lieutenant Tobias Broderick’s blond curly hair and cherubic blue eyes made him appear younger than his twenty-four years and masked a brilliant mind. He now said with considerable indignation, “In view of Captain Vespa’s extraordinary military record, and the fact that he was chosen by Lord Wellington to be on his personal staff, I find it astonishing that you should question his word, Major Blaine.”

  “You are mistaken, Lieutenant.” Major Blaine lifted a pair of cold brown eyes to engage Broderick’s angry stare. “I do not question Sir John’s account of what he believes to have transpired last evening, but—”

  Vespa interrupted, “Your pardon, sir, but my name is Captain John Vespa! I do not use the title.” Clearly taken aback, the major blinked at him and he took advantage of the pause to add briskly, “Also, I am perfectly sure of what happened last evening. As I told you just now, a high-ranking army officer was attacked on the street and later arrested, completely without justification, by an officious clod who called himself a Bow Street Runner! It was clearly a case of mistaken identity. I would respectfully suggest that you get in touch with Bow Street at once and arrange for Colonel Adair’s release.”

  “As should have been done last night, when Captain Vespa came here and reported the incident,” murmured Paige Manderville, adjusting the cuff of his coat.

  The large captain continued to gaze at that superbly tailored coat as he remarked, “And would have been done, Lieutenant, had we been able to verify Sir—er, Captain Vespa’s—er, assertions, but—”

  “Assertions?” said Vespa angrily. “Now see here, Rickaby, if you’ve been brought into the business to claim that my mind is still disordered from the knock I took at Vitoria, I’ll have you know I am fully recovered!”

  “And have recently taken another knock on the head, by the look of it.” The military surgeon tore his eyes from Manderville’s coat and moved to examine the cut over Vespa’s eye. “When did this happen?”

  “Last evening. While Hastings Adair and I were fighting off the thieves who attacked him. This cut is proof of what I’ve told you, so do not waste more time in trying to convince me that none of it happened!”

  Major Blaine said gently, “But, my dear fellow, we have no intention of doing such a thing. We’ve already been in touch with the Bow Street Magistrate and have a full report of the occurrence.”

  “Then why did you imply that you doubted my story?”

  “Only one aspect of the affair,” qualified Dr. Rickaby. “You were apparently confused as to the identity of the man you went to help. Logical you would be, all things considered.”

  Through gritted teeth Vespa declared, “I was not confused! Nor concussed! Nor hallucinating! Adair had a nosebleed after the fight. We called up a hackney coach. He said he’d been looking for me, and we talked for a few minutes about a—a personal matter. If you say I was talking to myself, you’re quite off the road!”

  Major Blaine put in mildly, “I’ve no least idea of to whom you were talking, but I know damned well it wasn’t the man you’ve named. Colonel Hastings Adair is at this very moment in France with Field Marshal Lord Wellington’s forces.”

  “The devil!” exclaimed Broderick.

  “Is he now,” drawled Manderville cynically.

  Vespa’s jaw tightened. “I don’t know why you would make such a claim, sir, or why Adair was rushed off to jail for some trumped-up reason. He’s not a close personal friend. But he’s a good man, and I’d try to help him out of a fix, even if I didn’t have my own sanity to defend. Good day to you, gentlemen.” He stood, his friends standing with him.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” asked Blaine, amused.

  “To find Colonel the Honourable Hastings Adair,” said Vespa, starting to the door. “When I bring him here, you may wish to make me your apologies.”

  The surgeon glanced at Blaine and volunteered with a sigh, “Very well. I can tell you where to find him.”

  Vespa turned back eagerly.

  “He took a bayonet through the thigh during the Battle of the Nivelle,” said Rickaby. “We’ve settled him into one of our charming field hospitals in Pamplona. I visited him there just before I started for home three days ago.”

  Blaine said reasonably, “So you see, Captain, poor Hasty Adair is quite unable to walk, much less to have left France and battled ruffians on a London street last night.”

  “Were I you, my boy,” advised Rickaby. “I’d go down to that nice Richmond house of yours and enjoy a warm and cozy winter and forget all this unpleasantness.”

  It was really remarkable, thought Vespa, that so many people were eager to put him out of the way. He looked from one kindly smile to the other and shook his head in reluctant admiration. “I’ll say this for you,” he said, “you’re jolly good at it!” He followed his friends and closed the door quietly.

  After a glum minute, “Damn!” said Major Blaine, slamming his quill pen onto the desk disastrously.

  Captain Rickaby sighed. “Stubborn fella, I’m afraid, Ed.”

  “So I was warned.”

  “It comes in handy sometimes. After Vitoria, for instance. He should’ve died. Wouldn’t. He’s a dashed good man.”

  “They all are. Broderick and Manderville can be dealt with. One way or another. But—Vespa…” the Major scowled. “His lordship’s hand is over him. To an extent.”

  Rickaby murmured, “D’you know, Ed, if it was up to me, I’d tell him.”

  “Well, it ain’t up to you,” snapped Blaine, glaring at him. “And it ain’t up to me. And how the hell could I tell him what I don’t know myself?”

  “You don’t? Jupiter! I thought surely a man in your position—Then—who does know?”

  “I don’t know that, either. I only know it’s not to be talked of, or whispered, or even, God save us all, thought about! So this conversation must not be mentioned outside these walls.”

  “Lord, man! I’m your cousin! You surely know I’m to be trusted?”

  “Of course I do, you great clunch. Secrecy! It’s a double-edged sword at best. The inevitable result of all these cautions and prohibitions is that everyone’s wondering what the devil they’re not to talk, or whisper, or think about!” Blaine scraped back his chair and went to stand at the window and glower at the rain. “It must be curst big, Rick, whatever it is. Did you notice there’s been not one word in the newspapers about that fiasco last night?”

  “Early yet, old boy. Besides, London’s unhappily replete with robberies. Not surprising if one goes unnoticed.”

  “Is it not?” Blaine gave a snort of derision. “Yet another murderous attack on a popular young war hero who appears to have become a magnet for violence. Do you really suppose the newspapers would not begin to ask why? Or that they would ignore such a story?”

  “Humph. Well, perhaps they—”

  “Besides which, Jack Vespa’s sire provided the grist for a scandalous rumour mill. And to add to all this, another slippery customer has oozed onto the scene. A rogue we’ve been after for years, and never managed to so much as detain for questioning!”

  Rickaby frowned. “I didn’t hear about that. Only Vespa’s report that there was a second attack.”

  “Just so. A second attack involving a tall man with a foreign accent and a giant for a servant who tossed Adair about like—”

  “Oh—e
gad,” gasped the surgeon. “You’re never thinking it was—”

  “Imre Monteil. The very shady Swiss munitions maker. And his monstrous Chinese henchman.”

  “Be dashed,” muttered Rickaby. “If only half the tales one hears about that pair are truth…”

  “I’ll tell you one thing, coz,” said Blaine after a brooding pause. “If Imre Monteil has a finger in the pie, it’s a rich pie! A very rich pie indeed!”

  3

  “I suppose I need not ask if the rain it still drips?” Lady Francesca lifted her eyes from the Morning Post to direct a mournful glance at Consuela who knelt in the window-seat, gazing down into the busy street. Her grand-daughter confirming her supposition in a rather abstracted fashion, my lady sighed. “A wretched climate has this small island.”

  “Then only think how fortunate we are,” said Consuela, “to be comfortable in this lovely hotel instead of outside in the cold and wet.”

  Refusing to feel fortunate, my lady sighed again. “How I miss my sunny Italy. Can you wonder that I yearn to take you back where you belongings?”

  “And where would that be, Grandmama? In the middle of the English Channel, perhaps? The Italian side of me facing to the south, and the British side to the north?”

  “Do not be flippant, signorina! Your blood is of a royal Italian House and is warm, and your temper it blows hot, in the Latin manner! As for your British side—”

  Consuela turned and smiled at her. “My British side loves this funny old island, dearest. As it loved my adored and so very talented English Papa. And you know perfectly well that I mean to wed an English gentleman, so—”

  “An English gentleman who does not even know his real name,” snorted Lady Francesca. “No, do not send me dagger glances, miss! I know you are fond of Captain Jack Vespa, but—”

  “Much more than fond, Grandmama! He is the bravest, kindest, most truly honourable gentleman I—”

  “You will not interrupt, if you please,” interrupted my lady, rattling the newspaper at her granddaughter. “For him to try and his interest fix with you, this it is not proper.”

  For some days Consuela had sensed that her diminutive grandmother was pondering something, and guessing what that something was, she knew this would be a serious talk. She left the window-seat, therefore, and came with her light dancing step to sink onto the footstool before Lady Francesca’s chair, the pale pink velvet gown rippling about her. “He did not exactly declare himself, you know,” she pointed out meekly. “It was more of a ‘testing the waters,’ Toby said. A ‘supposing this,’ or a ‘supposing that,’ and if such and such chanced, might I then consider him.” She smiled tenderly. “Poor boy. He was very careful not to make me feel that we had plighted our troth, so that I could be free if other gentlemen offered.”

  “If other gentlemen offer? Of course they will offer! At the ball last night the beaux were fluttering around, and you have already today receiving two charming bouquets, is it not? Nor dismiss from your mind that very handsome young colonel.”

  “Colonel Adair is back in France with Lord Wellington. I doubt we shall see him again until the war is ended.” Despite this assertion, Consuela knew she must be careful; she was sure her Grandmother really liked Jack, but if she set her mind against him, it would be disastrous. She said airily, “Besides, you may be à l’aise, dear Nonna. Romance, so they say, is capricious, and a lady seldom marries her first love.”

  Lady Francesca shook one finger under her granddaughter’s small nose and said perversely, “This it is the talk of a flirt, signorina, and ladies who flirt have the reputations and sometimes end with nothing more!”

  “What about gentlemen who flirt? John Vespa loved another lady once—”

  “Si. Long ago. But you know very well he has eyes now only for you. And it is unkind in extremity to tease the young man.”

  Consuela asked demurely, “Then you think I should accept if he really makes me an offer?”

  “No! And—no! A most strong no! You will accept him only in despite of my strict disapproval, child.”

  Startled by such vehemence, Consuela searched the old lady’s face and found there a stern resolve. She said in dismay, “But—but, you are most fond of Jack!”

  “Si. This it is truth.”

  “And when Sir Kendrick shot him you helped nurse him and grieved for his sake, and now we are helping him seek out his real father. Although,” she added, forgetting her earlier caution, “I care not a jot whether his father turns out to be a well-born gentleman, or—”

  “Or—what, Miss Rattlepate? A highwayman? A footpad? A murderer? Do you care not the jot if your children have inherit the consumptive habit? Or madness? Or the disease that brings sightlessness? What is in the blood will out!”

  Consuela was silent. Then she muttered, “As if Lady Faith would have chosen such a one for her lover.”

  “Ha! Look who she chose for her husband! A pretty monster!”

  “True. But her parents chose him, not she. Besides, can one really tell? Sir Kendrick Vespa was to all outward appearances a fine example of aristocracy: handsome and clever and elegant. And inside he was a cheat and a murderer several times over! An honest coal-heaver would have been a better choice for a husband!”

  “This also is so. However, one is born to a certain station in life, bambina, and no matter what people may say, this it will never change. Was we all to become the coal-heavers there still would be the strongest among the heavers, or the one who sells the most coal would become the Aristocrat among Coal-Heavers and gradually he would pull away from the common herd. It is the way of the world. You loved your papa. Do you thinking he would countenance a marriage between Consuela Carlotta Angelica Jones, of the royal house of Ottavio, and a young English captain who has a haunted and decaying old country estate and expectations of the smallest?” Lady Francesca flung up one hand, silencing Consuela’s attempt to comment. “I know what you will say. He was, and I admit this, a gallant and brave soldier. But he also is either the son of the wicked Sir Kendrick Vespa—who was directly responsible for your own father’s death—”

  “You know he is not Sir Kendrick’s son,” interposed Consuela fierily. “That evil man almost killed Jack as well as my Papa, and—”

  “In the which case,” overrode the old lady with a daunting frown, “your Captain Jack is the natural child of a mystery man about whom we know nothings at all.”

  “But we will, dearest! You and I and dear Toby and Paige, we all are trying to help Jack find the gentleman.”

  “And if we succeed, how then is it? Your fine captain is too fond of his Mama to shame her by refusing to any longer bear her name.”

  “Y-yes. Perhaps. But—but if we find that his real father is a fine and honourable man, then you can at least be easy and know what his—his background is.”

  “And Jack still will be no less of a bastard who will accept neither the Vespa fortune nor the title!”

  “Grandmama!” Her cheeks pink with anger, Consuela sprang to her feet.

  “Signorina!” Lady Francesca stood also and drew herself up to her full fifty-seven inches. In her stockinged feet Consuela was four inches taller, but her grandmother’s head was thrown back regally, her fine dark eyes could still flash fire, and in that moment she seemed to tower over the girl.

  “You will be quiet and pay me heed,” she commanded, her voice harsh. “I am knowing of the great service Captain Jack Vespa made us in proving your Papa’s murder. I am knowing of the fact that his life he risked and almost lost in saving yours. We are beholden. It is for this reasons I have allowing you to come to London with me, and that I will help him in his quest. He is a good man, si. But when all the facts are whispered about Town, as soon they must be, he will be a very much disgraced man. Your line it is proud. Your prospects they are most fine. I would be a poor nonna if I allowed you to be shamed by marriage to a man whose only hope for holding up of his head is to leave the country!”

  “Oh!” Wrath rend
ered Consuela almost speechless, and to add to her mental turmoil was the awareness that the old lady loved her and wanted only the best for her. “H-how can you speak of him so?” she spluttered. “He is—is one of the most popular young men in London! Everybody likes him and has only good to say of him!”

  In this, however, she was mistaken. The maid, who at that moment was admitting Captain John Vespa to the suite, neither liked nor admired him, and what she had to say of him to her intimates was far from good. Violet Manning, whose life was not unpleasant, might grumble, as was the fashion, about her ‘fussy’ employers, but she was also proud of them. She lost no opportunity to point out that although the Duchess of Ottavio was a foreign lady, she was highly born; that Mr. Preston Jones had been among the greatest of Britain’s artists; and that his daughter, Miss Consuela, might have had an Italian Mama, but there was royal blood in her veins, and she could look as high as she pleased for a husband.

  To Manning it was little short of tragic that her mistress must instead smile upon Captain Vespa. Miss Consuela was perhaps just a bit short of being judged beautiful, and she could get very cross very quick, but she was pretty and full of life and charm, and she had a lovely body. Captain Vespa had a scar down one temple, and he limped. People said he was a fine athlete before he became a soldier. He was not a fine athlete now. Worse, he was evidently touched in his upper works, for why in the world would a sane man refuse his rightful title?

  She took Captain Vespa’s hat and cloak and scanned without admiration the ally who trotted in after him. Another example of poor judgment. The captain could have adopted his father’s bloodhounds; to have such creatures as Solomon and Barrister at his heels might have lent him a bit of interest and dignity. But—no! The great hounds had gone to live in the country with Lieutenant Manderville’s father, and the captain was accompanied as always by ‘Corporal,’ a small dog with long greyish-brown hair and no consequence whatever. It was all of a piece, thought Manning resentfully, and opened the drawing room door to announce, “Captain Vespa, my lady.”